Roatan, Honduras

Also known as the slightly scary experience where we ate some weird but good food.

 Port day Three landed us in Roatan, Honduras:  a sliver of an island only four miles wide. Our goal for today was just to go to the beach and do some snorkeling.  We ended up deciding to hire a somewhat shady taxi driver named Benny to drive us out to a private beach. Private meaning you have to pay to use it. So, yes. A Tier 3 decision. As we were being ushered around in a 1992 Honda Accord with no a/c, Benny told us a little about Roatan. Apparently, they produce nothing. They have no exports, only imports. Their main industry is tourism.

 Despite being a little leary of Benny, he did as promised: delivered us to a gorgeous beach. The he waited around for us while we snorkeled, laid out, got sunburned, and drove us home.

 This was my view for much of the day. There were a TON of locals who walked up and down this beach hawking their wares. "Wanna massages, lady?" We purchased nothing. On the way back, we got into a discussion with Benny about the fact that they hunt (illegally) and eat iguana. He asked if we were feeling adventurous. Sure!

Benny took us to this little roadside restaurant.

This, ladies and gents, is Iguana. Looks like chicken? Tastes like a chewier, slightly gamier chicken. Also, beans and rice and fried plantains. I thought it was just meh. Matt, on the other hand, loved it. Which is good because we ended up trading plates. I got this: 

 Steamed Grouper. It. was. amazing. Easily the best food of my whole trip. I'm craving it now. My mouth is watering.

 This nice gentleman above is Bertie. I'm fairly certain he's preparing more iguana right now.

 Once again, the road takes you right along the coast. Some really cool views.

 I wish I could remember the details about this ship but I did ask if it had been dragged there and they insisted that it was a real ship that had run aground and been abandoned.

We headed back to our ship sorta early and took a nice long shower and nap. This is me. Dorking around on my Kindle. I hope you enjoy this super closeup of my feet. 

 My dinner outfit. Mostly, I just love the bracelet I picked up that day in Roatan. It's made of Tagua Seeds.

 And Matt was there too.

 And just some random shots.  This was a black forest cake we bought while on board. It was okay. Meh.

 The view from the Lobby all the way up to the top of the ship. Also know as the Dream Atrium.

 This was by far my favorite dessert of the trip. Warm Chocolate Melting Cake. I had it three times. Judge me. It was amazing.

 And this was a delicious looking Tiramisu. I didn't have any so I can't tell you if it was any good.

Tomorrow: Final Port... Costa Maya

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Belize!

Our second port day found us in Belize. When you cruise to Belize, they park the cruise ship about a 15 minute boat ride away from the shore (because it's too shallow) and you ride a Tender (smallish boat) over to Belize City. 

 (Belize City from the Tender)

 We walked straight past the Carnival tours and found a Tier 2 gentleman who bartered with us for what we wanted: Cave Tubing and Ziplining. The final price we agreed upon was about half what Carnival cost. Score!

We piled into a van with 8 other very nice people and our fantastic tour guide. As he drove through Belize City he gave us a very fascinating and informative tour. Probably my favorite little factoid was that while there is a Speed Limit in Belize, they do not employ ANY highway patrolmen. I really wouldn't mind going back to Belize again. I found it to be a charming and beautiful country (where the official language is English).

We drove about an hour into the country for our excursion. We started out with a Cave Tubing tour. It was so cool. We took about a 25 minute hike through the jungle/rainforest with our tubes. I saw the largest anthill I've ever laid eyes on. We also saw some Howler monkeys. I didn't get ANY pictures of the cave tubing because again... it was a water excursion and we didn't feel like risking getting the camera wet.

I would like to point out that the zipline excursion is the main reason I wanted to take THIS cruise. I wanted to go ziplining in Belize. Bucket List check!

I would also like to point out that I wasn't even the least bit scared. These guys working with us were extremely careful and safe. It was awesome. I can't recommend it enough. 

Plus, I had this totally hot guy (the barechested one) along for the ride.

 I really wish we'd had more adventure type excursions like this one. 

Toward the end of the Zipline thing, one of the guides leaned over and pointed to something on the ground.  It was this: 

 He assured us we need not be afraid of her because she was laying her eggs. Oh sure. Sorry. Didn't help. Spiders are not my favorite thing.

Overall, the zipline was easily my favorite part of the trip. 

 I'd do it again. And again. And again. 

 Especially with this guy by my side. I'm so freaking lucky!

Then it was back to the ship. That evening, after dinner, we attended a dance performance. It was pretty good! I enjoyed the dancing much more than the singing, but it was a better use of our evening than what we had done previously (aka: fall asleep... hey! we're old, leave us alone). 

 Self portraits just aren't self portraits without duck face, right?

We are just SOOO klassy!

Tomorrow: Roatan, Honduras

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Cozumel

Being that Cozumel was our first port, Matt had done a lot of research about the best way to get around, what to do, etc.

The way I describe your excursion choices is by tiers.
Tier 1: Book through Carnival. Everything will be organized for you. But you will be in a group with a million people. Also, the most expensive option.
Tier 2: Keep walking. After you pass all the Carnival people, there will typically be another company waiting there to offer their version of Carnival's excursions. Pretty reliable, smaller groups, about 1/3rd to 1/2 less expensive than booking with the cruise line.
Tier 3: Keep walking. You will come upon a somewhat sketchy looking group of locals who are willing to drive you (usually no more than 2 people) all over the place in their own car. Usually, dirt cheap. Sometimes, (as in the case of one of our shipmates) they may need to take a detour to go to a different dock and pick up a package for their brother and deliver it before they can take you where you wanted to go. Possibly a little scary.

For all of our ports we chose options 2 or 3.
In Cozumel, we rented a car. Not just any car. This sweet little ride:

A convertible smart car. It worked perfectly and cost the same to rent as a compact would have. Plus, when you're driving on crazy streets that you aren't familiar with... yeah. Smaller car is better.

Also, check out how awesome we look!

Speaking of crazy streets...I guess I need to point out that I have never been outside the United States unless you count going to Canada (and I don't). We had been driving for less than a mile in Cozumel and we came across this nice gentleman. He was a one man pothole filling machine. No cones. No orange vest. Just this one dude who carried about his job while people whizzed by him on both sides. 

The plan was to drive out to the San Gervasio ruins which are the largest Mayan ruins on the island of Cozumel. The drive out there was lovely. I am continually awed at some of the ramshackle places that people were actually living in. I don't think I can ever complain about our home again.

Matt has plans to paint this home. Probably minus the car. People in Cozumel are not afraid of color.

 According to the very nice and knowledgeable tour guide at the site the San Gervasio Ruins were once a hub of worship of the goddess Ix Chel, deity of the moon, childbirth, & fertility. Apparently, it's where everyone went to get married and get pregnant. I told Matt we chose the wrong ruins as I was NOT there to get knocked up.

 There were a lot more pictures of the ruins, but frankly, you have to be there to enjoy it. The pictures don't do them justice. The reason these are ruins instead of more fully formed buildings is because when Spanish explorers came knocking, they blew the place sky high looking for Gold. Nice, eh?

One of my favorite parts of the park is that it is also a wildlife refuge. I saw about 20 (probably more) large iguana just lying around.

 Apparently, they don't bother people. We'll talk more about iguana when we go to Honduras...

The worst part was actually the mosquitos. I put on a TON of bug spray and sunblock and while my lily-white skin didn't get burned, I managed to walk away with about 8 bites. 

 After we left the ruins, we drove over to a recommended restaurant (apparently, locals will ALWAYS refer you to a tourists restaurant). When we got there it was nice and quiet. Just Matt and I in the entire place. I ordered fish tacos and Matt ordered grilled fish. While we waited for our meal we sipped on $3/bottle water. Grrr.... AND THEN.... Two (2) tour buses arrived with people from a Carnival excursion. We were SO annoyed. Fortunately, we ate quickly (and our food was pretty good) and left.
 
 This was the view as we drove down the coast. California and Florida have got nothing on this. 
We stopped at one of the free beaches on the way (Corona Beach) where we did some snorkeling. We don't have any pictures of anything we saw because we didn't have an underwater housing for the new camera and our experience with disposable underwater cameras is not good. We got to see some brain coral, lots of little fish that seemed to follow us around and even a barracuda. We returned our rental car, haggled with some vendors for some souvenirs for the kids and headed back to the boat. 

Overall, Cozumel was our least favorite port. It was the most developed and definitely the most tourist driven of all our destinations. We had fun anyway!

Tomorrow: Belize!

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12 years. One Vacation.

A couple of months ago, Matt and I realized that we have NEVER, not ever, in our entire parenting experience left our children for an overnight getaway. And by golly, we needed to do that. Anytime we've taken a vacation we've had a young baby that has come along.

Fortunately, our children have all extricated themselves from my bosoms and I am once again a separate entity. Also, we have some amazing friends who volunteered were drafted to watch our children while we went off galavanting across the globe for an entire week. Yes. 7 Nights of uninterrupted sleep.

So we did this:

 A seven night Western Caribbean Cruise aboard the Carnival Dream. Neither Matt nor I had ever cruised before and didn't really know what to expect. Everyone we knew raved about cruising. I will now vacillate between giving you a review of our cruise and a travelogue of our adventures.

Things you might not know:
1. We don't enjoy crowds.
2. We don't like feeling like tourists.
3. We fancy ourselves mild foodies.
4. We don't drink or smoke.
5. We don't gamble.

Seems like it might be a recipe for disaster, eh? Well, it's not all that bad, but I don't think we'll cruise again. At least not with Carnival. Having said that, we had a FANTASTIC TIME! But I completely attribute that to the company of my husband.

 I like this guy. Also, I am very white. Yeesh! We purchased a new little point and shoot camera (a Canon S95) for the trip because I was not about to lug a huge camera around with me. It turned out to be a great choice and every picture you'll see was taken with it.

 Saying goodbye to Florida! Suckas! This actually makes me laugh because, well, this looks like paradise to most people and I live there.

We are fairly certain that most people headed straight to the bar the moment they stepped on the boat. While we didn't witness any scenes of awful public drunkenness, there were A LOT of people walking around with alcohol. As early as 8am. Beer with your breakfast, much?

 Food on the boat was was very... uh, American? For the most part. There was a Mongolian BBQ place and a really fantastic Tandoori Chicken and Fish. It really is like a week-long all you can eat buffet. But since the food was (to us) only a touch better than fast food for breakfast and lunch, it wasn't too much of a temptation for us. We did, however, splurge on the dessert buffets. Yeah. Mildly embarrassing. Lotsa dessert.

Dinner, however, was (again, for the most part) another story. We ate every night in the Main Dining Room. And the food was interesting and delicious. Again, the desserts were heavenly!

 There will be a lot of pictures like the above one. You know. Hold out the camera?

We opted to splurge and get a balcony room. It was worth it. Gorgeous views like this?

 Every morning. Beautiful breezes. Sigh. This? I miss it.

There were two "Formal Nights" where you're supposed to get dressed up super fancy. Some people wore tuxes. Some people wore khakis. We were middle of the road. There were also photographers around EVERY SINGLE corner trying to lure you onto their cheesy background for a photograph. Pass. We didn't have a single one of those pictures taken. No way.

The first full day was spent entirely at sea. If you don't drink or gamble, there's always the duty-free shops. We did not go shopping. What did we do? Laid out up in the adults only section and read books. Went to the gym where I ran some and lifted some. Hung out and watched TV in our room. Explored the ship. And stressed.

Stressed? Yeah, see... the husband had heard that it was a big waste of money to book your excursions through Carnival. A simple thing like "going to the beach" becomes a $100 affair. So, his plan was to wait. Get off the boat, and then decide what to do. Did you know that I'm a bit of a control freak? Just wingin' it? Doesn't work well for me. So, Sunday evening I had a totally tearful breakdown wherein I confessed my fear that "we were headed all the way to another country with no plans and what if we didn't get to do the things we'd hoped for and ended up having a lousy time?"

Good thing I married a man who can talk me down. He assured me that it would work out. I'm so glad I have him.

Have I mentioned that I brought knitting? Because of course I did!

 This is what it looks like when I knit in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico.

 I'm fairly certain I made almost no progress on my project. Apparently my motto for the week was "Why knit when you can nap?"

Yeah. I really liked the balcony. Which is funny since Matt spent almost no time out there with the exception of one failure of a breakfast. Their continental Stateroom Breakfast was less than tasty. We don't recommend it.

I'll be back tomorrow to discuss our first Port: Cozumel.

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Well, that was awkward.

Before I go into excruciating detail about our trip, I had to share my favorite thing ever. Possibly.

You've met my son, Miles, no? Miles is six and has just recently finished Kindergarten. This makes us laugh because if you know Miles, you know that he is no ordinary Kindergartner. It helps that he is one of the oldest children in his class because his birthday falls a mere 24 days after the cutoff. But in general, he's just a really cerebral child.

On the last day of school, Miles brought home his Kindergarten writing journal. These are always entertaining. So, I paged through it. I'm so glad I did. So often, when the kids come home, I just toss everything right in the trash. I have a loathing for random papers hanging around my house. At any rate, I flipped to the front of the book and was entertained by some of the year's first drawings.

 For example. This one from October of 2011 dictating his plans for Halloween. I am told by both Miles and his teacher that she does not help with spelling, grammar or punctuation in these journals. So, every apostrophe is his own.  And the drawing. Just awesome. Have I mentioned how hilarious I find it that my children always draw themselves brown? It's true. They are brown.

The next entry that had me laughing was this one:

In case you didn't know that Christmas is really about Christ. For the record, we do NOT own an ornament like the one Miles drew. But now I need to get one, apparently. 

Then we came to this entry. 

Mine too, buddy. At this point, I'm getting a little concerned that his teacher might think we're religious zealots. Don't get me wrong, we love the Savior and going to church, but we aren't coercing these entries.

I'm not sure if you can read this one completely, so here it is: "My baby sister, Libby, is the cutest person in the world. She would win first place in a cute contest! Would yours?"

Doesn't that just melt your heart?

The next entry deserves a preface. At my husband's employer they have a video game and movie lending library. You can bring home games or movies for a couple of days and if the kids have been particularly good, Matt will reward them with a video game. 

We love that he ranked his favorite games at the bottom. Apparently Indiana Jones is a no-go. 

Finally, this was the very last entry in the journal. And the one that sealed our fates as the parents of "that strange religious wacko kid."

 The tears. Running down my face. Oh mercy!

Oh Miles! We love you so much and are so proud of you! 

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Pardon the Break

But the husband and I are taking a must-needed vacation WITHOUT the children. I'm not even sure I know how to relax enough to enjoy this.

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